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The apartment was exactly as Jenny had left it: sterile, minimal, and utterly silent. She locked the door behind her and stood in the entryway, letting the quiet settle over her like a heavy blanket. After the noise and urgency of the emergency room, the stillness should have been a relief. Instead, it felt oppressive.

She moved through the space with mechanical precision, shedding her jacket and bag, toeing off her shoes and lining them up perfectly against the wall. Everything had its place. Order was the price of discipline, and discipline was the only thing that kept her two lives from colliding.

The apartment reflected that obsessive need. White walls, spotless floors, furniture chosen for function rather than comfort. No photographs, no personal touches, nothing that might hint at who she really was or where she came from. It was a cage she had built for herself, and she wore its bars like armor.

She showered first, letting the scalding water wash away the scent of blood and antiseptic. Her wolf stirred beneath her skin, restless after hours of suppression. Jenny closed her eyes and breathed slowly, forcing the beast back down. Not here. Not now. She had learned years ago to compartmentalize, to lock away the primal part of herself and present only the human mask to the world.

It was exhausting work.

Clean and dressed in soft cotton, she moved to the kitchen and assembled a simple meal. Grilled chicken, steamed vegetables, brown rice. Fuel, nothing more. She ate without tasting, her mind already drifting to the medical journals stacked on the coffee table. There was a new study on trauma protocols she wanted to review, a technique that might save critical seconds in the operating room.

But the burner phone sat in her bag by the door, silent but impossible to ignore.

Jenny set down her fork and stared at the wall. She knew what that phone meant. The Williams Pack crest that had appeared on her screen hours ago was a warning she could not dismiss. Her father did not contact her lightly. He allowed her this human life, this medical career, because she was valuable to him this way. A doctor, a skilled healer who could treat both humans and wolves. An asset he could deploy when needed.

But that tolerance had limits.

Jenny stood and walked to the window, looking out over the city skyline. Somewhere out there, people were living ordinary lives. Falling in love, raising families, pursuing dreams. They did not have to hide what they were. They did not carry the weight of responsibility and bloodline on their shoulders.

She pressed her palm against the cool glass and felt the loneliness settle in her chest like a stone. This was the price of her choices. The distance she maintained from her pack left her isolated from her own kind, but her secret made it impossible to form real connections with humans. She was caught between two worlds, belonging fully to neither.

A memory surfaced, unbidden. Mark, the charming resident who had asked her to dinner last week. He had been persistent, genuine, and kind. The sort of man she might have loved in another life. But she had turned him down with a firmness that left no room for hope, and she had watched him walk away with an ache in her chest.

She could never explain to him why. Could never tell him that any relationship built on lies would crumble eventually, and the truth of what she was would destroy him. Better to be alone than to drag someone else into the darkness with her.

Jenny retrieved the phone from her bag with reluctant hands and unlocked the screen. The message was brief, written in her father's characteristically blunt style: Family matter requires your immediate attention. Expect contact soon.

No explanation. No details. Just the warning, delivered with the quiet authority of a Pack Alpha who expected obedience.

Jenny read the words three times, anxiety building with each pass. She had known this day would come. Had dreaded it, pushed it to the back of her mind, and hoped against reason that it might never arrive. But responsibility was not something she could outrun forever.

She set the phone down and returned to the window. The sun was climbing higher now, casting long shadows across the city. Somewhere below, her colleagues were continuing their shifts, saving lives and making impossible choices in the span of seconds. That world was clean and logical. Medicine had rules, protocols, outcomes you could measure and predict.

Her other life had none of those comforts.

She finished her meal without tasting it, cleaned the dishes with meticulous care, and tried to focus on the medical journal. But the words blurred together, meaningless against the certainty that her fragile peace was about to shatter.